Newton School Committee News

Dear NPS Community,

The Newton School Committee has deep respect and appreciation for the professionalism and dedication of our educators, which is one of the reasons why our educators consistently rank among the top in statewide salary comparisons. In negotiating a successor contract, our pledge remains to continue exercising good faith, under the umbrella of state assisted mediation, to reach a mutually beneficial, fair and sustainable agreement with the NTA.

Over the past few weeks, we have received many questions from the community about the contract negotiations. Therefore, we requested that the Superintendent and her team create a resource to help the community better understand our current negotiations. This resource contains information about the following:

• Current competitive salaries and other benefits provided by NPS to our valued employees
• Salary comparisons between Newton and other districts
• The financial cost of various proposals under consideration

The full document is linked here: Negotiations Information: Salaries, Benefits, District Comparisons

Additionally, during last night’s School Committee meeting, Superintendent Nolin articulated that as part of her Entry Planning review, she had growing concerns that absent immediate additional financial assistance, the district would be severely constrained in providing targeted programming supports, improvements, and intervention efforts.

In response, our Committee proposed that the Superintendent create a list of funding needs for discussion at the next School Committee meeting on November 6th. Mayor Fuller expressed strong endorsement for providing additional financial support to NPS and stressed the importance of transforming one-time funds into ongoing support. The Committee looks forward to having a collaborative discussion of district financial priorities during our next School Committee meeting.

Sincerely,

The Newton School Committee

The next School Committee meeting will be held on Monday, November 6, 2023 at 7:00 p.m. All meeting information can be found on the School Committee Meeting Information webpage.

Additional negotiations updates will be shared during the meeting. All updates are posted on the School Committee negotiations update webpage as well.

Meeting materials can be found on the School Committee Meeting Materials webpage.